A Random Assortment

~ Francisco found the coloring book that our kids will be using when they're old enough: Color Your Own Italian Renaissance Paintings.

~ This is excellent (look at the pictures!)--"Who Wore It Best: Pope Francis or Olivia Pope?":

Olivia Pope sports her endless collection of luxe coats like impenetrable breastplates, usually in a color telegraphing her level of inner turmoil; here she is offering herself up as a peace-making angel, ergo pure snowy white, with the cape on coat even providing a vaguely winged look—and an extra layer of armor between her own noble intentions and the roving hands of her bratty bureaucratic lover, President Fitzgerald Grant III.
It’s hard to compete with a guy whose vestments were chosen for him both by the Lord above and a trippy plume of (matching) white smoke. But Pope Francis also bests Pope-Comma-Olivia with a less uptight feel, which is saying something given that he has the more rigid dress code. His capelet is swingy; his garments fitted but not snug. And not for nothing, he’s got some bravura accessories.

Yes, dear friends, I am watching Scandal. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I have noble intentions: My students don't watch any good tv--The Wire, The Sopranos, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Friday Night Lights, etc. So they don't get my references. For heavens sakes, they don't even watch bad tv that I watch--like Downton Abbey. So I'm trying to watch what they watch, so I can give examples in class (it's working! Today we talked about how Hobbes relates to Scandal and they perked right up). I am a sacrificial teacher, admire me. (Just kidding--I love tv and I'm easily amused even by the low quality stuff.)

~ Adorable picture of Kate and William and George.